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Found 7 results

  1. NEWS! - xEnviro updates to v1.17 After another very long development cycle (v1.16-January 2021) Dark Space has released v1.17. Project leader Magnus Lorvik sites personal reasons, the same as in the earlier very long development cycles. Biggest note was that xEnviro will not be compatible with X-Plane 12, Enhanced Skyskapes, SkyMaxx are also not getting access either from Laminar Research... so any future updates will be X-Plane 11 only. Dark Star note; " We have decided to support xEnviro for X-Plane 11 for as long as it seems reasonable. We will refine the existing base we now are confident with and add features as we go along. We will update the roadmap soon.", but also say, " We are not saying that we won’t develop for X-Plane 12! As I said we know how we can do that, but both time wise and feature wise we are in the dark. It’s an effort we will pursue when X-Plane 12 is out of beta. (As usual)". This v1.17 version has Spherical buffer Full volume rendering "Spherical buffering is a method of generation of computer images of a three-dimensional scene constituted by a set of facets, viewed from a point of observation along a viewing axis. The facets are projected on the surface of a sphere whose center is the point of observation of the scene and wherein the surface of the sphere is divided in a special way into elementary surfaces, each corresponding to a pixel on the spherical surface, in such a manner that the orthogonal projections of the elementary surfaces on a reference plane passing through the point of observation and perpendicular to the viewing axis of the scene all have same value". Other v1.17 features include: Spherical buffer Full volume rendering implemented. No more separate layer rendering New cloud light scattering math New cloud formation logic. Now we can create clouds of any shape Smooth transition between stratus and cumulus clouds Thunderstorm clouds are back Incloud lightning Clouds screen edge quality slider added Draw high-level clouds checkbox added Updrafts added below cumulus clouds with vertical development Tropopause temperature control Basic VR support Weather search accepts Enter key Added X-Plane rain sound checkbox You can type several icao codes in the weather search window using virtually any separator and then hit Enter to get the list of metar report Added hotkeys via X-Plane key assignment menu to open xEnviro Weather Briefing or Settings window or call for CAVOK conditions. Passive cloud sync. Clouds look the same for all the xEnviro 1.17 users at a given time and a given location. This feature is important for online flights and shared cockpit sessions. This includes thunderstorms Other items in v1.17 include; Changed Atmosphere light scattering revised Visibility maths changed General scene light energy adjusted to match atmosphere conditions Clouds blur level slider changed to clouds dynamic blur Cloud base adjusted to better match reported values The turbulence model is changed to match long-term forces better Wind distribution changed to avail fake forecast reports for aircraft devs Post-processing maths and application order adjusted Increased distance for the city lights reflected by haze Server timeout reduced to 5 seconds New method to hide X-Plane DSF edge implemented Full control over aircraft icing. No more random icing in snowfall Removed Banding lines on distant clouds removed Clouds static quality slider removed. Noted issues include; "The 1:1 scale has its demands on performance. The main compromising issue in 1.17 is obvious when you load into the sim. Movement shimmer. This is not a huge problem when you fly slow and are gone when standing still. The artefacts are especially noticeable around the edges of the clouds. We have added a quality slider to reduce that shimmer - but at the cost of performance. This will be a continuous target to refine and improve for us going forward". At least v1.17 it should be far better than the block type clouds, and constant cloud redrawing that drove me mad at times. My heart dropped out of xEnviro for one major reason. Their so called "History" feature that never happened (so much for listening to feedback). In doing reviews to be able to recreate or manually set a certain weather condition is important for a consistent feel during the review. or to recreate a certain aspect (say snow or sunshine) to highlight the review. That feature has languished down the roadmap list for years and years (despite consistent complaints to Dark Star). It's a small thing, but in my case a deal breaker. However, if you continue to use X-Plane 11 then xEnviro is an essential tool that I would recommend, it does at least give a lot of atmospheric feel to the simulator. v1.17 certainly looks far better... The updated v1.17 xEnviro is free to current purchasers of the plugin... just go to the xEnviro site and download the updater application, serial number is required for activation. ____________________________________ Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine v1.17 by Dark Space FZE is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac will come eventually! Requirements Minimum Requirements X-Plane 11 - (not compatible with X-Plane 12) Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 8 GB+ VRAM Current version : 1.17 (October 10th 2022) ____________________________________ NEWS! update by Stephen Dutton  11th October 2022 Copyright©2022: X-PlaneReviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions)
  2. Plugin Updated : xEnviro v1.16 (v1.15) by Dark Space It is back! Yeah... Well it never really went away, but it did for me. This Environmental Engine is in context the only weather application to have if you want totally realistic weather (sort of) in the X-Plane Simulator, but after nine boring months of X-Plane11's dull bland weather system, I will take anything that xEnviro will deliver. I was already bouncing between the buggy v1.13 and the very old v1.07 versions of xEnviro before, but with Vulkan unsupported by the xEnviro plugin application, and as I entered the beta phase of the X-Plane11.50 (Vulkan/Metal) update, then I lost the tool completely. 11 months in development and finally out came the next update in v1.14... but only for OpenGL, yes I went a bit bonkers in the fact that X-Plane 11.50 had already gone final (Sept) and now this was the 23rd November 2020, and I was still locked out of this application... use OpenGL... not on your nellie. Christmas Eve and I was away on a Christmas break, then when out of nowhere came v1.15, so xEnviro was finally now also Vulkan compatible, Yeah! Merry Christmas, the best Christmas present ever... and thank god for all that, only that when I installed it, it was that v1.15 still didn't work in the current (beta) Vulkan, but only on the final version of X-Plane v11.50, so I had to dial everything back to the last final update and kill the beta version... but, but I had both xEnviro AND Vulkan together and finally working. Laminar were also close to the end of the v11.51 development and then it also went final in the last throws of 2020, and because it was a final, we then got another quick (fix) update to xEnviro v1.16. The motto of this story really means on how much we have to persevere to use this application, but for once Dark Space did update (twice) and quickly to Vulkan. Let us be totally frank and up front... xEnviro is still very buggy, and a massive framerate killer... but also totally invaluable to your simulation needs. Suddenly everything is alive again as these first images show when running in v1.15. The light flows around you and you can actually see everything again in the cockpit... so the view difference to the standard X-Plane feel below are quite significant. You also had to work twice as hard (or sometimes four times as hard) to get the same feel and light into the images in the X-Plane default lighting... ... and in creating the reviews it just creates a lot of extra work, and they STILL feel ordinary. xEnviro however when installed then explodes onto your screen and its images break into beautiful lighting. Terminator times are obviously the best lighting periods, as seen here... ... and the effect is or can be totally mesmerising. v1.16 There has been a huge amount of development work done on this application, and that aspect can be seen from the changes between the v1.13 and v1.16 settings panels.... again! I have totally lost the plot on what the settings panel actually was laid out with since the start of using xEnviro, every update brings in a new and completely different settings panel layout? and again in v1.15 has changed quite significantly. Most of these slider changes came in with the v1.14 update... including : Clouds static quality slider, Clouds dynamic quality slider, Clouds detail range slider and the Clouds blur level slider of which all were added, two checkboxes were also added including the aerial perspective checkbox and night perspective checkbox. The surface snow drift effect was also a part of the v1.14, but the seasonal effects (meaning that brilliant snow coverage) won't now work in Vulkan (damn). Removed also in v1.14 was the Full Clouds coverage checkbox. Results are complicated, but it does give you a huge amount of control. The Brightness, Contrast, Vibrance and Gamma sliders under the "Effects Settings" allow you a lot of control over your visual lighting and colour feel. Before you had to do this aspect mostly via your Graphic Card settings panel (NVIDA in my case), but these settings override them and you can now adjust on the fly, and visually to get the right look and feel you want, and it is a powerful tool in this aspect. Yes these setting sliders were in the earlier xEnviro versions, but I had forgotten on how really good and how powerful these tools actually were. I love the METAR data download feature as well, god I missed that one as well. In v1.15 more setting changes focused on the "Tone" areas... as a Post processing tone mapping system with a Tone mapping selector slider and a Tone mapping mixing level slider were all added in. The Maximum ozone level slider was removed and replaced with a single "Realistic ozone level" checkbox instead. Tonemapping is usually understood as the process of mapping color values from HDR (high dynamic range) to LDR (low dynamic range), so if a room is too dark you can lighten the room to see more detail... so mostly it would used in say inside the cockpit. The settings in Tonemapping are in six selections: Off, Luma, Photo, Flimic, Lottes and Aces... these examples are all at 100% slider. Can't see the differences, well they are there, but showing the same six settings in an exterior shot does show you the extremes... ... of the range of the tone available, however this is the full setting (Aces) and 50% tone level which gives you this... Tonemapping off (below), and I still think it is the best look visually. Main focus is on the cloud quality. The dramas of the long and wound out development of v1.14 was to try to get some efficiency out of those clunky 3d volumetric clouds. The results are half and half, but the point is you can at least adjust the sliders to get more performance now (or at least be able to find that best setting for your use), than be trapped by what settings Dark Space only gave you before. I lose about on average 10fr at the settings set below in the cloud settings with mostly all set on the "Medium" setting, but this at least in Vulkan is thankfully a workable environment... ... there are four settings: Low, Medium, High and Ultra and Cloud blur from 1% to 100%, Ultra is the most extreme... ... but in reality using Ultra is a total waste of computer power, and the differences are marginal visually. Clouds Overall the clouds are really good, here are some overcast cumulus on the base and on the top.... ... the effect is very good, but pan or tilt your view and you get a load of minute crosses as the clouds are replaced by artifacts... ... ditto in the cockpit, as if you pan or tilt your view in the cockpit you get this stutter. And it is slightly annoying if you are adjusting the knobs and controls a lot. The cloud static quality and dynamic quality adjustment does affect this stutter, and adjusting the sliders does help, but does not totally eliminate the stutter either. Another issue of a rolling wave of clouds as it builds, this effect can also be adjusted lower by having the cloud settings set in the low or medium positions. That bad squaring or blocking of the clouds has also been hidden, the flat sides can hstill owever be seen now and then, but overall the cloud edges are far better. The volumetric clouds are also softer (without using the slider) and feel and look more puffy, the larger artifact feel of the earlier versions have been reduced, so in reality you are getting more volume for better detail. X-Plane is still regulated to three layers of cloud, something that Dark Space rallies against, but it still works well at altitude... Dark Space have worked hard on getting the right ozone feel correct, to the point as mentioned to even removing the ozone slider from the settings panel, but you can still add in the "Camera blue filter" (to be used sparingly) if you want a more deeper ozone blue, but personally, a touch more is all you really need. Cloud shading is also very good, and highly realistic and the machines come really alive in many instances with the right conditions. Fog or minimum visibility is still highly and realistically impressive. The snow effect is good as well (rain and snow have been improved for v1.15), but you miss the ground coverage snow blanket effects in Vulkan, another quirk is the the wipers don't clear the snow away from the windshield either. Added in v1.15 are also new and better Windshield fogging and freezing effects. Another big favorite is cloud transparency, the visual feel through the cloud is very, very good, but you don't have the cloud shade slider anymore to adjust the cloud effect (shadow) onto the landscape, it is the one setting I would like back. And so overall this is what xEnviro finally comes down to... the lighting and the lighting effects of X-Plane the simulator. From the musty dawn... ... to the bright mid-afternoon sun, then dusk. The application transforms the visual impact of the simulator, the aircraft are pin sharp and very realistic in these great atmospheric lighting effects, if the best in X-Plane, xEnviro wraps you in the weather and better lighting conditions, and in that aspect alone it is a worthy tool. ______________________ Summary Still the outstanding Environmental application for the X-Plane Simulator. Still not perfect by any imagination, with a high framerate use and visual artifact and stuttering, but now being Vulkan v11.51 compatible it does go a long way in helping out the efficiency of this extraordinary tool. 11 months of development has refined a lot of the old quirks and dialed out a lot of the volumetric clouds issues, it is certainly better, but not at all perfect. More changes to the settings panel means a lot of sliders and options have been removed and replaced with better lighting sliders and tonemapping sliders, ozone sliders have been removed and replaced with a single option choice. With the use of Vulkan the excellent season (snow) feature has also been removed (hopefully temporary). Important features like a version for MAC OS and History (saved weather conditions), which are highly important are still very much buried at the bottom of Dark Space's to do list, in that aspect it is a very direful show from the developers. Most of the update changes in v1.16 (v1.15) are hidden well under the skin here, but you certainly feel the massive difference with this exceptional plugin working visually than being relegated to the average X-Plane default weather system of which I was for nine (long) months, the application creates a totally far better and vibrant environment all around you, and makes the X-Plane Simulator a far, far more realistic simulator. XEnviro is expensive, but also invaluable if you want an realistic simulator experience, you will need a lot of computer power as well, but overall the positives easily and overwhelmingly outweigh the negatives.... Highly Recommended! ___________________________________________  Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine v1.16 by Dark Space FZE is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac will come eventually! xEnviro Features: The only addon featuring volume rendered clouds and volume rendered atmosphere. Real time meteorological data with a smooth refresh interval from 5 up to 60 minutes. Atmosphere condition based on dynamic air parcel prediction model used for real aviation research and training. Atmosphere quality includes humidity, pollution and fine particle amount. Unlimited variability of cloud formations generated dynamically by the atmosphere engine. Advanced hurricane model based on actual data tracking and live feeds. Precise thunderstorm cell locations based on real time radar and satellite data. New physics based realistic sky coloring rendered using real time ray tracing and light scattering. Actual wind direction and speed for all levels as well as for the temperature, turbulence and windshear. Volumetric effects for different types of precipitation like drizzle, rain and snow. Reflective raindrops on windshield for any aircraft with virtual cockpit. Realistic cloud passing visual effects. Visual effects of aircraft lighting in clouds (strobe lights, beacon lights, navigation lights, landing lights). Landing lights effect during in-cloud and foggy flight. Volumetric external aircraft lights for selected set of aircraft. Light reflections by cloud surface from urban lights at variable intensities. Physics based light scattering for clouds. High quality real time cloud shading. Flexible settings for atmosphere, visual and sound effects. Surface crosswind component can be reduced during ground roll for users with no rudder pedals. Realistic braking action and braking degradation based on actual reports. Atmosphere and cloud light scattering and color depend on atmosphere quality, weather conditions and time of day. Environmental sound engine with ambient sounds and capability to add custom sounds to X-Plane scenery. xEnviro is the most technologically advanced tool that uses the most progressive technologies. xEnviro has a user-friendly interface with flexible settings for each component. xEnviro uses its own art assets along with its own sound library. xEnviro does not alter X-Plane shaders, textures or any other files. xEnviro does not require installations of any additional products or libraries and is fully ready to use out of the box. xEnviro software is constantly being updated. xEnviro has been designed by simmers for simmers! Requirements Minimum Requirements X-Plane 11+ Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 8 GB+ VRAM A quality and powerful Graphic Card and System is recommended Current and Review version : 1.16 (January 4th 2021) _____________________________________________________________________________________ Plugin Update by Stephen Dutton  11th January 2021 Copyright©2021: X-PlaneReviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions)
  3. Plugin Update : xEnviro v1.10 DarkSpace has released an updated new version of their environmental engine xEnviro to v1.10. Yes it's finally here... sort of. The ping pong story of xEnviro is going to be one for the grandkids, but we are holding in there and the release of v1.10 is at least a step forward. I will put my hand up and say I am a big fan of xEnviro, in reality it is absolutely everything I am against in buggy software, but I still use it... well v1.07 anyway which is currently over two and a half years old... v1.08... nah crap, v1.09 even more crap with seriously bad shadows on the aircraft (greyed out)... so we waited, and waited and well waited. So here is v1.10, and it is well... still extremely buggy but at least finally workable. A note in that because xEnviro is only available with real world weather (no history or save weather conditions) then this quick overview look at the new release is bound by the weather conditions I can find, as more different conditions come up I will add them in as they become available... but we can start here. The developers also have made a very long statements about the condition of the release and in that they are still wrestling with certain conditions (as we shall see) but think that at least we should at least (after waiting years) to get a working weather engine. As noted xEnviro is not even close to being an acceptable product, but even in this situation it is absolutely brilliantly good, as it is in the exceptional feel and look that it delivers to the simulator, that xEnviro delivers almost perfect visual realism feedback... it is always the total feel and look factor that really delivers here. First Look xEnviro have wanted to move to volumetric clouds and away from the slideshow image base, the cloud image way was actually not bad, because it was extremely efficient, the problem with volumetric clouds is that they are very processor hungry, note to Laminar's famous cloud "puffs"... and we all know how they at first all pulled down your framerate. The issues with the "puffs" was they were quite large, and of course the smaller you can scale them, then the better detail that you can get, the problem here is mathematics, the smaller you go the higher in the square goes the number required, so even if the lower initial resolution is minute the sheer volume of the order of magnitude then can simply overwhelm the processor again... in other words you are back to square one. So what is required is the volumetric clouds at an smaller efficient level, or at the same efficiency you currently have... so more for the same. So the first look at xEnviro v1.10 is really a look at the current situation of the progress and in reality this is still in the experimental stage. In reality currently (and DarkSpace) acknowledge this is the fact that to get the smaller resolution and also the magnitude required for the quality, it is not going to happen in our current systems. In yes they can make it work, but only at a severe framerate cost... Users note they are getting low single digit framerate drops with installing v1.10... but the fact is that the framerate drop is only 2-3 frames and in fact I am not really seeing a major impact of the v1.10 application on my normal simulation flying (there is however a tendency to rotate around frame rates, say 34, 33, 28 and back to 34...) this is usually present in any new software that is not yet refined... we are always aware that heavier weather will use more framerate so that aspect has to be also taken into consideration. So for those with their framerate issues with v1.10 then you have the usual plugin conflicts or your just overloaded in too many different (and sometimes too many artificial changes) of the basic X-Plane simulator software. I don't or will never change the basic X-Plane software no matter what enhancements that will give me... so funny enough I never have issues with new plugins or applications when updating or upgrading or mostly single digit framerates... funny that? First view of xEnviro v1.10 (above) is that it looked extremely good, it ran well as well (note the framerate number upper left of the screen at 41 fr) at my standard normal X-Plane settings. One noticeable area was the cloud shadow ground reflections (the dark bits), they are good, but overall always too dark, so the shadows are consistent and not variable between the lighter cloud formations and the darker more dense ones, so it comes across as blotchy, it looks okay, but different darker shades of grey could give it more realism as all shadows are not created equally. Worse is the reflected clouds are set out in blocks.... so you see the nasty outlines of the cloud reflection block zones as clouds can currently create formations at high levels or squared sectors of clouds... xEnviro note this is a bug and it is on the list. ... but either fix it or remove the cloud shadows, as they are noticeably distracting. You also immediately see the artifact issue, and it is not pretty, In reality this is not good enough for a pro application, but I will note that those images were taken not adjusted and sometimes the whole window has the artifact effect... There is a "Blur Level" slider that can minimize the worst, or soften up the clouds a little but you can't really get around the core of the visual artifacts until they are addressed. With every new xEnviro version then the setting menu usually is vastly different... again this is the case. With v1.10 a lot of the original settings that have been taken away compared to v1.07. Removed from V1.10 has been: Resolution slider has been removed. Complexity slider has been removed. Reflections range slider has been removed. Detailed range slider has been removed. Maximum drawing distance slider removed. Post processing checkbox removed. Remove scenery shadows under overcast checkbox removed. Billboard clouds have been completely removed. Crepuscular rays temporary removed. Draw crepuscular rays checkbox has been removed. Camera shift slider removed. Somehow you feel too much adjustment has been taken away like the removal of the "Shadow Range". Crepuscular rays have also been temporary deleted. Not much is left in the menu really is there, but two new ones added are really interesting... Top new slider under Effects Settings is the "Maximum Ozone %" that adjusts the Ozone layers density % percentage... Below is the "Camera Blue Filter". this adds a blue tinge to the feel. Another new slider is the special feature.... Snow! xEnviro have work on the idea to create a blanket snow, in not changing the internal textures, which is a slow cumbersome and very time consuming business to simply change seasons, all we really wanted is an easy change of seasons, and snow is the most visual... they have done that effect here and the results are magnificent... the bottom slider is adjustable from 0% to 100% snow coverage. Percentages set here are 25% - 50% - 75% - 100% Around 65% it is about the best seasonal setting I have yet seen in X-Plane... totally brilliant. Landing at EGCC - Manchester of where I have some winter textures, it is very good, far better than my winter custom made ones. The effects will partly cover the runways as well, it worked some times, but not others and like the snow percentage slider itself (If we could always have the manual control of the slider, that would be a great bonus)... so that is all another WIP. How they achieve this with just software I don't know, but it covers any custom scenery, houses and traffic.... Any mountain range that requires the mountain snow effect works as well... ... currently however one downside to the snow is the snow effects on the screen and the aircraft... you get these little snowflake objects that don't look yet realistic? called "precipitation which follows the camera" (in other words static) and It looks still like another WIP, personally I think it should be dropped in the release version until perfected or fixed as it one of the biggest visual intruders... The cloud effects around mountain areas have had a lot of work done, overall it is now quite perfect, but in some instances there is a slight horizon line around the mountain shapes and on the actual horizon, but certainly not as intrusive as that nasty horizon line in v1.07... Visual effects are spectacular in the right regions, here is Innsbruck... we will compare the default X-Plane11 weather ( left) with xEnviro v1.10 (right)... The feel and mood in the valley is excellent.... twilight is sensational. One of the major things that made me dump v1.09 besides the grey out, was the airport lighting disappeared as you approached the runways, this was fixed in an update, but I didn't bother as I couldn't use v1.09 anyway... but here it is thankfully definitely fixed.... The sheer versatility of xEnviro is in situations like this, here we have a heavy summer shower, but the bright sunlight is just behind you, so you are flying into the rainstorm, but the bright side sunlight light is in there also... ... for realism in these conditions it is very, very good. Overcast cumulus that spreads from horizon to horizon is spectacular, and it comes with not a big penalty hit on your framerate as well, I lost two frames for all this magnificence so it was worth the damn two frames... New: I saw these excellent "Lens Flare" scenes so I had to add them in. Yes Lens Flare can be switched off in the settings menu, as it can be very bright in many conditions, but I love it... Note this brilliant lighting scene here (below left) at Page Field. Fl. The three sequence of images above shows the excellent lighting effects of the Lens Flare from full exposure, to partial exposure behind an object, then a full blockage of the lighting via an object.... in the very first image a partial blockage is created by the fun park wheel of just metal spokes, shows the fine tuning of the lighting detail. If you don't look to close you can't doubt the amazing vistas... No more above cloud grey-outs... yeah! and the cockpit windows now also blend in or are translucent, which was very noticable in v1.07. As noted earlier, I can only show what I can see or use currently, if any new vistas are visited and are worthy of a viewing then I will add it into this update review, so please check back for any changes. More notes... to get the best current settings with xEnviro v1.10 you need your Antialiasing set only at 4xSSAA+FXAA... if you go to 8xSSAA+FXAA you get a blank vista, lower and the clouds get far more artifacts... for Settings then the "Wet Aerodrome" selection tickbox NEEDS to be off to clear a matrix effect (Precipitation follows camera), and if you are using the Librain plugin, then the "Windshield Effects" has to be off as well. Summary To sum up there is one big notable thing to say... I'm still using v1.10, and that in itself is a huge step forward. Older issues have been (finally) addressed, but the change to volumetric clouds is still very much a work in progress. Main issues are (very) visual artifacts, poor cloud shadows (now non-adjustable), matrix screen and noticeable snow effects on the aircraft... if you can accept all that, then the benefits of this application are excellent with great atmospheric conditions and highly realistic cloud formations.... when you get the right conditions then xEnviro will blow your mind with the results... New features include the global snow effects and they are simply brilliant, Ozone and Blue filters are in there as well. It is not like the past where you sort of stepped backwards, and stepped forwards at the same time, this a step forward... but by how much is debatable. Problem is still the old problem, the developer in not fixing the basics and always going for the global scale, so we may be stuck with v1.10 for a fair while with no intermediate bug fix updates. It will be also interesting and this why I think v1.10 suddenly appeared at this point, that the Coming FlightSimExpo in Orlando at the weekend 7/8/9 June is that I think the developers here are wanting or hoping the Vulkan/Metal API improvements will be included or announced... certainly a tie-in between the power of the new API's and xEnviro may be critically important, the developer noted this in his notes, that far more processing power is required to achieve the required results. No doubt the supreme result is there, you can see it and almost feel it, but xEnviro still feels of too much an early demonstrator of the technology than the completed form. I will keep using v1,10 and see where it goes... v1.07/8/9 is free to all current xEnviro registered users, just go to the xEnviro site to update : xEnviro.net ______________________________________________________________________  Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine v1.10 by Dark Space FZE is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac is coming eventually! xEnviro Features: Load real-time meteorological data with download interval from 5 up to 60 minutes taking into account following factors: Wind direction and speed on ground and aloft, temperature, turbulence areas, icing areas and dangerous phenomena (thunderstorm& windshear) Simulate visual effects of different types of precipitations and phenomena: rain showers, snow, fog; Simulate visual raindrops effects on windshields both in 2D and 3D cockpits (if it's loaded in aircraft model); Simulate in-cloud visual effects; Simulate visual effects of shades and aircraft lightning in clouds (Strobe lights, beacon lights, navigation lights, landing lights) Simulate landing lights screen� effect during in-cloud and foggy flight; Volumetric lights effect; Simulate lightning on clouds surface from cities lights; High-detailed cloud shades; Custom cloud density and range; Simulate realistic breaking action effect; Display saturation, color gamma and cloud density, depending on weather conditions and time of day with real-time changing (automatically) or manually. Requirements Minimum X-Plane 11+ Stable Internet Connection with data Speed no less than 512Kps Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 2Gb VRAM Recommended X-Plane 11+ Stable Internet Connection with data Speed no less than 51 Mbps Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 4Gb+ VRAM Current and review version: 1.10 (last updated June 2nd 2019) _____________________________________________________________________________________ Plugin Update by Stephen Dutton  5th June 2019 Copyright©2019: X-PlaneReviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions)
  4. News! - xEnviro environment plugin updated... again to v1.09! Errr! what happened there? Just a few days after the release of the long awaited v1.08, then v1.09 is very quickly on the blocks with some fixes. Changelog v1.09 notes: All notable changes to xEnviro project will be documented in this file. ### [Known issues] - Freezing during initial start up - Camera zoom is not supported by the volume rendered atmosphere. - Incorrect camera angle inside 3D cockpit. - Rough objects edges at mid and low resolutions ### [1.09] ### Added - Cloud shadows. - Checkbox to display crepuscular rays. - Crepuscular rays. ### Changed - Blending for overcast layer adjusted to avoid early terrain clipping. ### Removed - Cloud shadows distance slider removed. Certainly it is very nice to see (for a change) a quick response to bugs and issues, my guess is that v1.10 will not be long in coming along either. So where is the xEnviro 1.08.... 09 review? There is one thing to note about xEnviro and that it is a bit of a shape shifter, and that is not an excuse. You don't have the tools to adjust the plugin as it runs in real time, so you can look at certain elements and then when you return then those elements have totally changed... so you have to build up a picture over a period of time, plus now we suddenly have updates also coming along. When everything settles down, I'll give you my perspective on the updates, but currently it is mixed, from the really brilliant to the "not sure about that" categories, overall it is far more to the brilliant than the other end of the scale, I will note though the feel is again quite different from 1.07/06 These images (v1.08) are over Albuquerque, New Mexico, and they are quite spectacular, and note the clear silhouette over the Sandia Mountains and the clean line to the horizon, impressive! v1.09 is free to all current xEnviro registered users, just go to the xEnviro site to update : xEnviro.net ______________________________________________________________________ Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine by Commercial Simulation Systems LLC is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac is coming eventually! _____________________________________________________________________________________ News by Stephen Dutton 18th April 2018 Copyright©2018: X-PlaneReviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions)
  5. News! - xEnviro environment plugin updated to v1.08! xEnviro has released the next version of their environment plugin to v1.08. This update is not the full completed version that xEnviro were working towards, but since the events surrounding the developer and his family, then this WIP progress version has been released. This v1.08 version has been in development for over 8 months and the basic code of the engine has been completely rewritten, plus it has a lot of new special features and effects, but I do stress the development was stopped and not completed, so expect issues and bugs, and don't expect any quick fixes coming anytime soon either? However it is a very stable release and has been extensively tested. v1.08 changelog notes are... All notable changes to xEnviro project will be documented in this file. ### [Known issues] - Freezing during initial start up - Camera zoom is not supported by the volume rendered atmosphere. - Incorrect camera angle inside 3D cockpit. - Rough objects edges at mid and low resolutions ### [1.08] ### Added - Cloud and atmosphere resolution slider. - Cloud complexity slider to adjust the amount of detailed cloud puffs. - New, volume rendered atmosphere. - Rain intensity dataref. - Snow intensity dataref. - Terrain surface condition dataref. - Windshield precipitation effect and corresponding checkbox added. - Post-processing shader is back. - Sun glare. - Camera lens flare effect. - Checkbox to display or remove lens flare effect. - Seasonal data now calculated and accumulated on the server. - Terrain surface condition data now calculated and accumulated on the server. - xEnviro now publishes seasonal data for the scenery developers. Details can be found in the SDK. - Moon with position and phase based on the current system date and time. ### Changed - Turbulence model adjusted to have less evenly distributed areas of the same air velocity. - DSF drawing distance has been increased to hide sharp visible edge under the distant haze coverage. - Maximum haze blending distance adjusted to hide the DSF edge. - Cloud texture map have been changed to include only the basic shapes allowing for more cloud varieties. - Cloud shadow and tone maps have been moved to the separate cloud noise texture. - Cloud transparency model is now based on the noise chart. Clouds will grow up more naturally and solid clouds will not be transparent anymore. - Cloud shapes and forms are based on dynamic flow noise with smooth animation and transformation. - Haze model adjusted to match all the calculated turbidity levels. - Plugin architecture has been re-arranged for deferred rendering. - X-Plane internal visibility limit adjusted to hide distant lights in low visibility conditions. ### Removed - X-Plane scattering level slider removed. - Minimum drawing distance slider removed. This distance now set in the middle between detailed and maximum drawing distances. - Cloud brightness slider. Cloud brightness is fully controlled by scattering and light equations. - Cloud shadows temporary removed. - Old, based on layers, atmosphere has been removed. - Upper atmosphere checkbox. - Lower atmosphere checkbox. - City lights temporary removed. ### Fixed - Surface friction procedures amended to avoid aircraft sliding. - Scenery lights no more visible through the clouds. v1.08 is free to all current xEnviro registered users, just go to the xEnviro site to update : xEnviro.net ______________________________________________________________________ Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine by Commercial Simulation Systems LLC is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac is coming eventually! _____________________________________________________________________________________ News by Stephen Dutton 15th April 2018 Copyright©2018: X-PlaneReviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions)
  6. Plugin Update : xEnviro Environment Engine v1.07 by xEnviro We all love something that fundamentally changes everything about the way you fly and interact with your simulator, in the last year since the end of November 2016 there was not just a simple fundamental change, but a complete cosmic wholesale change of the X-Plane simulator, in first the release of X-Plane11, the update of WorldTraffic to version 3 (coming real soon now) and the release of the xEnviro Environment Engine or weather engine. My very first impression of xEnviro was that it wasn't something that much very different, but a then I found it was simply extraordinary in the way it totally transformed your environment as you flew, it was and still is expensive. But I am a total convert in the way xEnviro gives you a complete and different feel to your flying. The release review is here: Plugin Review - xEnviro - X-Plane10 and 11 Environment Engine But xEnviro wasn't without it's if minor faults. Some clouds were very noticeable in the (cloud) images went the wrong direction, a black line on the horizon is hard to ignore and the worse issue is that it crashed to desktop in if the xEnviro server was off line or you couldn't connect to it, and in the process X-Plane11 went final as well, so there was no update to X-Plane11 in its final release form which created build up framerate issues now and again. These issues actually were not totally overriding as a major issue and to the day to day running and in fact all could have been rectified quite easily with a just simple update.... but after nine months that update never came, until now with this release of v1.07 The developers had committed to totally reinventing the main engine from just a slideshow image effect, which did actually work very well except for one issue as noted above, to the more modern voxel 3d mapping or a voxel grid, that uses each pixel with a given colour value in a frame. The idea is to give an item and in this case a cloud to be rendered as a volume in 3d. Clever and a much more modern way of reproducing clouds and common now in game development but it took a long time to create and test for the X-Plane simulator. xEnviro v1.07 First up there is a new start up panel, with a blacked out space to highlight the version number. The slight build up of your weather is still there as xEnviro slowly builds up your current local weather picture... Menus Main dropdown menus is still the same with just one extra new feature in the added "Weather Briefing"... ... the "Weather Briefing" gives you the current 20 local (close by) airport METAR conditions, you can refresh the data anytime to see the current conditions. The "Settings" layout is changed as well from the X-Plane10 (below left) old style to the new X-Plane11 (below right) style which looks far more modern, but the layout is basically the same but there are a few important changes to note. In the first column "Weather Settings" there is a new slider setting to cover "Maximum Surface Wind Speed", which is good because the surface wind speeds were a bit nasty and mostly too strong in v1.06, so you will mostly keep this low and I set it at 5kts. Second column is "Cloud(s) Settings". The actual slider settings themselves have not changed. but the values have in "Shadow Range", "Clouds Brightness" and a slightly more (cloud) crossfade is required to a full 200%. First the brightness. I found there was far more wider set of values in the cloud brightness and so it needed to go up a few %. Second item is more important. Cloud "Shadow Range' is much more touchy and in fact it has a far less range than before, so in heavy low cloud conditions with break though light or in say twilight and dusk conditions it gives you a heavier darker cover... the change from great lighting (below left) to full darkness is very, very small and you are on the far lower end of the scale at 4 here, and few selections up and you are suddenly in complete darkness (below right). There is a great need to get the "Shadow Range' right, because the effect is very good (below) when it is in it's full effect mode, with excellent light, shadows and colours on the landscape, but overall I feel the "Shadow Range' adjustment is in need of a more wider range to be more accurate. Third Column in "Atmosphere Settings" has he most changes on the settings panel. Atmosphere has been split into two sliders now with "Upper Atmosphere" and "Lower Atmosphere" and gone is the selections for Rain and Snow effects. Lightning effect is also gone and all are now set automatically in the system. 3d clouds passing effect tickbox has been moved up with the new "Remove Scenery Shadows under overcast" selection, and 2d rain drops and 3d landing light effects are now listed together. X-Plane related "Post Processing" and "Light Scattering" is not changed on the settings menu, but the underlying engine has been completely revised. xEnviro v1.07 has been totally reworked to intergrate more with the X-Plane weather engine far better than in v1.06, in fact they didn't work together very well at all in the past. So I always had the "Post Processing" switched off, but now I have to have it on to get the same effect, same for light scattering, you will note a lot of the X-Plane11 misty look is not as strong with v1.07 but xEnviro compensates for that in its own engine, but at far distances it is now more noticeable as X-Plane builds up the scenery... Here you can see the differences with the new scattering changes... ... with the "Light Scattering" slider down in 0% (above left) where I mostly had it positioned before, now you need it in the opposite position (above right) at 100% to clean up the horizon, and so in v1.07 all the Atmosphere Settings need to be readjusting to your liking and not left or set as in v1.06. Fourth column are the sound settings and nothing has changed in there at all. _________________________ First Impressions xEnviro v1.07 First off it is important to note that it is very hard to get a full overview in a short time of any environmental engine or plugin. atmospheric and weather conditions cover a huge range and it took me a fair period to really appreciate xEnviro and what it could really do. I have a huge backlog of memories and images that are simply outstanding in the way the plugin recreates your total environment, once used xEnviro is very hard to not be part of your X-Plane world, yes I am a huge fan, but I was also won over only in a period of time and not completely at first sight. xEnviro is live. The environmental plugin shows you current METAR data as it is right now or your current time. If you are at your home airport or close by then X-Plane via xEnviro can dispaly what the weather conditions are right now. It can be spookily accurate as I have found by just looking out of my window or watching the conditions locally as they happen. Not perfect but pretty close. Note in v1.07 the conditions can now recreate such weather events like the Hurricanes off Florida U.S. lately and obviously many users jumped at the chance to check it out... I myself checked out a local cyclone in February earlier this year and it was quite realistic. But currently and still in v1.07 you can you only have the live version? A "History" version is still in the feature list and not part of the current line up, which will not allow you to recreate certain weather conditions, it should be on the now todo list not a long way down a feature list... ... another feature on the todo list is the MAC version? in fact it is at the bottom of the todo list which is just plain stupid, who came up with this business plan? as not only are the developers neglecting a large percentage of X-Plane users but their significant income as well? That is just plain crazy business or just dumb stupid! One item that has had attention was the issue that if the xEnviro server went into meltdown or you went offline from the server it caused an X-Plane simulator crash and usually in mid-flight. This was a nasty bug and was caused by the "Wininet exception handling code" and it has been addressed so we will see if it doesn't ruin another flight... One of the fears of moving to the voxel 3d mapping was the effect on framerate. Laminar's "small puffs" but their heavy framerate load rears its ugly fears, but the voxel 3d mapping is a very different concept and framerate thankfully is very good, in fact I think it is improved and I checked it out in very heavy cloud conditions and it ran without any major framerate drops, but that is not to say a weak computer or extreme weather conditions can change the deal, but overall I was very impressed by the running of xEnviro in v1.07. So let us look at some pretty pictures... I took two flights with one around KRSW in South Florida and one flight from ENGM - Oslo to ENBR - Bergen in Norway, first KRSW. xEnviro does do towering cumulus clouds really well and they do feel that they have more volume and thickness... ... but I didn't like the shelf like cloud formation that looked too wafer thin (arrowed below), I have seen these low thin stratus clouds before, but not this wafer thin, thin. It looks very effective though from above angles (below right), but not close up or head on. Translucent effects are very good. One of the thing that really impresses in xEnviro is the great translucent feel between you and the ground and it still gives off a great realism look and feel. The effects are very good with darker clouds and conditions, but in certain conditions it changes... ... in the darker areas as the aircraft become a little fluorescent and glow, it is highlighted sometimes if the lighting is very shadowy, I didn't see that in v1.06? But the aircraft here at Oslo standout far too bright and are far lighter in contrast against the darker airport. Another point, is there is far more lines in the clouds and again noticeable only under certain cloud conditions... ... I'm not going to say these lines are a negative as I expect them to be fixed quickly in the next update, but they are more pronounced than in v1.06 of which there was a few even in there, but not this many? In the positive the lighting can be sublimely beautiful, the lighting effects when full on are simply overwhelming. Note the excellent cloud shadows on the ground. Flying from Oslo to Bergen and the more you fly in xEnviro the more you love it, and just enjoy those excellent formations. But I do feel the clouds do pop-up or pop! into view more suddenly than they just faded into view in the v1.06 past, that is very and even more like X-Plane weather than xEnviro there. But overall v1.07 was highly impressive all along the route and the formation changes nicely from full overcast to scattered low cloud as I approached Bergen. Mist, fog and rain was always really good in xEnviro and that has not changed in v1.07. Rain conditions are well done, but to highlight then look at the rain falling at the other end of RWY35 but clear on the threshold (above right)... ... in time the rain moves north and turns into light mist, giving you a very realistic feel around the airport and far into the mountains. Summary xEnviro Environment Engine is an exceptional addon to X-Plane to create a totally different feel and weather aspect to your flying. And overall this new v1.07 is excellent. But there is a few raw notes that should have been easily cleared up at the beta stage, and should have not been passed over to the release version. v1.06 of xEnviro was on the whole a fully rounded product, but here there should have been a few more cleanups here before release. There are too many lines in the clouds and the clouds pop up and disappear far to often in full view. Atmosphere Settings need more range and the darker effects send the aircraft fluorescent. Mostly I call all these items just fine tuning, but with a product this expensive they should have been refined earlier, I hope we don't have to wait long for a fix? Overall this v1.07 is not a feature packed update, those items will however come sooner now the new voxel 3d mapping structure has been administered, that was a basic but fundamental core change, and all the benefits of that change will in time be more apparent. xEnviro is a cornerstone of X-Plane that every user should have running, I admit it is not cheap, but ask any user that have laid down the cash if they think it was not worth the investment? Not any, and neither would any user that has once used xEnviro would go back to the default X-Plane weather engine because it is really night and day in the sheer difference the plugin creates when flying in X-Plane. I did note it took me a short while to see the benefits, but more so now than ever after ten months of use I couldn't or even won't run X-Plane without it running in the background, it is as important as that or with the sheer visual appeal and even the sheer enjoyment the plugin provides makes it simply a major requirement for X-Plane simulation flying... it is that great or even brilliant. ______________________________________________________________________ Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine by Commercial Simulation Systems LLC is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac is coming! Features xEnviro was created for X-Plane 10/X-Plane 11 as a result of multi-year effort from high-level engineers and programmers of Commercial Simulation Systems® LLC. xEnviro replaces the default X-Plane environment, making it more realistic. X-Environ Features: Load real-time meteorological data with download interval from 5 up to 60 minutes taking into account following factors: Wind direction and speed on ground and aloft, temperature, turbulence areas, icing areas and dangerous phenomena (thunderstorm& windshear) Simulate visual effects of different types of precipitations and phenomena: rain showers, snow, fog; Simulate visual raindrops effects on windshields both in 2D and 3D cockpits (if it's loaded in aircraft model); Simulate in-cloud visual effects; Simulate visual effects of shades and aircraft lightning in clouds (Strobe lights, beacon lights, navigation lights, landing lights) Simulate landing lights screen effect during in-cloud and foggy flight; Volumetric lights effect; Simulate lightning on clouds surface from cities lights; High-detailed cloud shades; Custom cloud density and range; Simulate realistic breaking action effect; Display saturation, color gamma and cloud density, depending on weather conditions and time of day with real-time changing (automatically) or manually. Requirements Minimum X-Plane 10.45+ or X-Plane 11 + Stable Internet Connection with data Speed no less than 512Kps Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 1Gb VRAM Recommended X-Plane 10.45+ or X-Plane 11 + Stable Internet Connection with data Speed no less than 51 Mbps Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 2Gb+ VRAM Current version: 1.07 (last updated September 16th 2017) Software Compatibility with other plugins xEnviro® software is incompatible with 3rd party software is used for weather loading, visual effects and other products that modify environmental or graphical components. Correct operation of xEnviro® software is incompatible with the following products: SkyMaxx Pro RealWX Pro MaxxFx Real Weather Connector SoundMaxx FS GLOBAL REAL WEATHER xNoaaWather FlyWithLua RTH script VenturaSky Blu_fx Any other scripts simulating weather conditions Prior to install xEnviro® software it is recommended to deactivate these applications in Plugins menu in simulator or delete them (up to X-Plane user). Change log : Version 1.07 (September 16th 2017) Added - Weather Briefing window added. Displays METAR for 20 nearby stations. - General status dataref. - Dataref for the weather radar data (precipitation echo). Changed - Maximum wind speed now set in Knots. - Wind distribution has been changed to improve ATC reliability. - Blending adjusted to remove visible line of the ground mesh edge. - Internal representation of the weather is now based on voxel arrays. - Atmosphere colors adjusted to match X-Plane 11 light model. - Rain color and blending adjusted to match X-Plane 11 light model. Removed - X-Plane implemented ball mark for the selected menu entry. Temporary * removed. - X-Plane fog cutoff slider removed. Fixed - Water reflection for haze added. - Wininet exception handling code has been corrected. No more crashes hopefully. - Surface friction procedures amended to avoid spontaneous aircraft sliding. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Update Review by Stephen Dutton 19th September 2017 Copyright©2017: X-PlaneReviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions) Review System Specifications: Computer System: Windows - Intel Core i7 6700K CPU 4.00GHz / 64bit - 16 Gb single 1067 Mhz DDR4 2133 - GeForce GTX 980/SSE2 - Samsung Evo 512gb SSD Software: - Windows 10 - X-Plane 11.02 Addons: Saitek x52 Pro system Joystick and Throttle : Sound - Bose Soundlink Mini Plugins: WorldTraffic 3.0 Plugin - US$29.95 : XPRealistic Pro v1.0.9 effects US$19.95 Scenery or Aircraft - ENGM - Oslo Gardermoen by Aerosoft (X-Plane.OrgStore) US$24.95 - ENBR - Bergen Airport by Aerosoft (X-Plane.OrgStore) US$21.59 - Zibo Mod Boeing 737-800 - Default X-Plane11 aircraft by Laminar Research
  7. Plugin Review - xEnviro - X-Plane10 and 11 Environment Engine Simulation of weather in a simulator is one of the really difficult tasks of realism. In all its forms weather is complex and very diverse and changes forms constantly to the requirements of our planet's systems. Real life commercial flying is always looking for more and more information and data on what and how to predict on what the weather system is going to do next, and we want to simulate that on a computer, when they can't even do that in the real world. So mega supercomputers are mostly created for one job, in creating the world's weather system and maybe throw in a few military applications on the side to pay for all that processing power, but simulation users want the same power on their desktop with as close to no framerate hit in the bargain, well you might have just got your dream. Every one complains about X-Plane's default weather system. It is slow, difficult, a soaking framerate sponge of processing power and in a way doesn't really reflect the changing weather patterns that we face flying everyday, but in reality Laminar Research would need a whole complete separate department to tackle such a major feature, as with most areas in X-Plane's diverse eco system, the weather is just one part of it and only has the same rotating attention of all the other items that need addressing to make up the whole. Even in the add-on third party world the releases for the weather effects could be counted on one hand, and most usually just messed with X-Plane's resources "skycolors" but they just replaced the same files and didn't tackle the basic weather engine to make a more significant change and actually something better. Sundog's Sky-Maxx Pro was the first Environment Engine that did do something different and finally gave X-Plane a workable weather engine, but the next generation of these plugin Environment Engines from Commercial Simulation Systems is now here in the form of... xEnviro - Ultimate Environment Engine. It would have been very easy to have just written a quick review on my first impressions of xEnviro and most of the review would have been an average assessment of this new development and take in and agree with most of the other first sighting users that have been critical of the product. But I was aware that from my first flight within the xEnviro environment that this was a more significant product to the simulator than what you see on a first glance, and so this review is week late after forming a deeper and more rounded and tested opinion by using the plugin quite significantly over the week. But make no doubts that there are areas that still need development, and some things are a bit glaring... and then there is that price? US$70 for a plugin is expensive, and even I gulped at the price. But like everything else to be considered is that if you want the best it doesn't come cheap, but there has been a large team and years of development to bring this plugin to your desktop. It has had as much development as some of the biggest and most complex aircraft in X-Plane, and we would think nothing of acquiring them for the same cost. xEnviro Let us look at the most interesting things about this plugin first that must be noted. First it is completely separated from X-Plane. So there is no connection or changing of files with the X-Plane simulator. You want xEnviro off, you just turn it off and it is gone, press it on again and there it is (it does take a minute or so to rebuild), secondly it works not only in X-Plane10, but it is ready for X-Plane11 as well and you can insert the plugin in both applications (registration is required) and use both as you wish. This disconnection from the X-Plane application also means it is highly efficient, gone too is the heavy processing "cloud puffs" and hello to horizon to horizon clouds. Don't get me wrong that you get no processing loss at all because you do, but it is highly efficient. This efficiency has also created criticism because it is created by using 2d objects and not the more modern 3d objects like X-Plane's "cloud puffs" do, and in some moments they do show their heritage as some clouds do look slightly flat or with an odd movement across the windscreen, but the total visual effect is astounding and very realistic, if the choice was with either the heavy 3d objects or the efficient 2d version you have here, then it is no competition in which version I would choose to use. At this point you can only use the xEnviron in "real time". When running the plugin download's the latest METAR (Aviation Routine Weather Reports) high wind data and the latest reports from aviation weather data centres to create a complete map of your current position. Now that means you only get the current "live" weather. If you like me live in Australia, if I fly in the UK, then I get the winter weather UK time which means a night flight here will give me early morning UK mist and heavy cloud and not the hot and mid-summer Australian conditions. Even in a replay you don't get the weather replayed but the current "live" weather under the replay, so that means you can't redo that heavy storm landing that you did last night. It also means that you can't set up a weather event or save your current weather that you liked so much, but xEnviro have noted that a save or memory (noted as "History") of your current weather download will come in a future update. So live it is and the data is very good as we shall see. You do soon get used to this and it does make for some interesting flying, and take note that you are at the complete mercy of the current conditions and are not being able to cheat and change the conditions to make it easier for you. Installing xEnviro Currently the plugin is Windows only (Mac is coming soon), so there is Windows a "Enviro.exe" to start up an installation application. First the setup application will ask you for your language, then click okay. The a "Welcome" screen... Then you are asked not to be naughty and accept the license conditions. Then the application checks to see if your computer can install the plugin, it is noted that you are to be connected to the internet at all times (xEnviro won't work or be able to download data if you are not). And then set the address to your "X-Plane/Resources/Plugins folder" for installation, I found it easier to install on one version (X-Plane10) and then copy and paste to the other (X-Plane11). Then It notes the address and you start the install, when done it notes the "installation is complete" and the tickboxes choices to view "readme" and visit xEnviro's site... If ticked you are then sent to the site which is handy to note updates and changes to the plugin. Updates are also downloaded from here, so it is worth bookmarking for future reference. On starting X-Plane the "xEnviro" plugin is listed in the X-Plane plugin menu bar. Four items are listed on the menu: On CAVOK Settings About xEnviro But on the initial startup you will be asked to register your email and serial number (for any or both X-Plane applications that you have installed the plugin)... then activate the plugin. Menu On Is just a switch to turn xEnviro on or off CAVOK Starts up the plugin by clearing off the X-Plane weather and resetting the simulator ready to receive the xEnviro data. It is important to note that it take a little time for the plugin to reach it's full settings or coverage, sometimes up to a minute, it is not noted if the CAVOK button is a reset? But I would assume it is. Settings Pressing the settings selection will bring up a panel that covers four areas: Weather Settings Clouds Settings Atmosphere Settings Sounds Settings In most all settings here it is mostly to cover the look and special effects of xEnviro, than more of adjusting it. You can set percentages of the Minimum RVR (Runway Visiblity Range), and Ceiling and Turbulance on the Weather settings. and you have choice to use the "Easy" or "Real" modes. Weather update slider can control your downloads from 5min to 60min (1 hour), I found about 15min data downloads to be about right with the better expected 5min too fast in the changes.. Cloud percentage settings are the same in adjusting Minimum and Maximum visible ranges, Detailed range, Cloud reflection Range, Reflection Range and Shadow range. Lower is Cloud brightness (darker the better) and crossfade speed and again on the power of your computer you can select "light" - "Optimum" - "Maximum" pre-selected settings. Atmosphere Settings setting cover mostly special effects like atmosphere, rain, snow, lightning, 3d lighting/clouds, light scattering and post processing. I found that post processing darkened the weather (clouds) too much so usually kept this switched off. Again you have pre-selected settings of "Simple" or "Full", mostly you keep most of all these special effects switched on. Sounds can be adjusted for noise in internal and external sounds for the aircraft, and special effect sounds like ambient and scenery sounds can also be adjusted with a total volume slider to cover all sounds at the bottom. I rarely touched sounds for adjustment and they are very good and the pre-selected settings are "Disable" - "Optimum" - "Maximum" Obviously you don't get the complete control that would really like, but as noted more settings will come to save and use "Historical Weather" data. I would like the adjustments to adjust wind and wind direction or at least turn them off, as some times I require that for aircraft testing or reviews. About xEnviro Is the plugin's current version number and your registration details. xEnviro How to best approach xEnviro was interesting to get the best results from the plugin. I couldn't set up a certain scenerio or environment to note differences or changes because xEnviro only runs in "real" time. So what we have here is one UK route Manchester EGCC to Exeter EGTE over five days and flown at various time and conditions. It is Flybe's most busiest route (out of Exeter). I picked the UK, because first it is familiar and two the weather at this time of the year is very changable. There are other areas noted like Florida and Australia, but most images here are on that route. Equipment used is FJS Dash8Q400 and Carenado's B1900D. Another note is that this review was done mostly in v10.50 but there are a few images of note in X-Plane11, but at this point XP11 is just too much in transition. Flight One This flight was early morning from MAN to EXE. The first thing that strikes you is that the clouds don't look 2d, more 3d and the sheer depth of the formations, breaks gave clear patches of blue as were required, but transparency is very good as we shall see later. Cloud altitude was low, around 2000-300ft ADSL and adjusting the cloud slider's brightness gave them more depth. But the biggest effect was the early mist around the hills in the distance from EGCC, it was extremely good and very realistic, in some ways xEnviro turns X-Plane10 into X-Plane11 with a great visual haze. On this flight the low cloud was also thin so you passed through it quite quickly into the bright Azore blue above. This started my first inner conflict. Is it too blue? Personally I think it is, a few notches lower in brightness would bring in a more subtle feel as I am at only 10,000ft here and not 40,000ft, but you do get used to it. One area I don't like are the blue water reflections below, they would never be bright blue at any angle and so you get all these bright blue patches (even under cloud?) that dot the landscape, I never got used to that. During the climb the X-Plane ground scenery became hazy, realistic... and any cloud formations traveled across your windscreen, but in the early version you saw the 2d effect quite badly as the line went across the windscreen, the later updated version (v1.04) finds this addressed, but it does still happen in certain circumstances and my guess it will be hard to totally eliminate. One thing that is very noticeable is the breadth of the cloud cover, it goes from horizon to horizon and not just the exact same pattern but in totally different cloud formations, it is quite brilliant. All types of clouds in the atmosphere including the highest cirrocumulus, cirrus, and cirrostratus, mid-level clouds like altocumulus and altostratus, and low level clouds like stratus, cumulus, and stratocumulus are all well represented Viewed internally and the view is breathtaking, cloud layers are spread out all around you with your framerate rock solid. Make no mistake there is a framerate penalty, but you laugh at the shear ease these formations move and create themselves around you with absolutely no fear the darker clouds are going to scrub away your fun as the framerate plunges to double digits or single digits in as many circumstances with X-Plane's default weather and heavier puffs. There are some clouds that appear and disappear (pop) right in front of you, and yes it is noticeable sometimes, but you can adjust the timing of the new data and the crossfade speed can be adjusted, but I think that more refinement here is still to come. One aspect that is an issue is that reflection on aircraft that have tinted windows (mostly all) don't allow for complete transparency of the background through them. The early release version was quite bad (above right) but it has been addressed and it is not as bad as it was, but in certain circumstances it still does show (above left). Another aspect of xEnviro that is important is that it will look good only with HDR (High-Dynamic-Range imaging) switched on, and that is not a factor in X-Plane11 as it is now tuned only in that way. But with HDR off in X-Plane10 you get a very bad case of the jaggies or very poor anti-aliasing. It is even worse at night (right), HDR has to set quite high as well, but remember you do have more framerate headroom to play with. The suns brightness aspect angle is very good, there are no bands on the screen and the gradients between the bright and darker blues were very good. On the descent notice you how really good the transparency is as you go lower and the air gets less dense below you and the ground, the formation of the clouds in their gaps show up really well with excellent transparency and ultra realism. Most of the coverage here was only cirrus clouds, but it was the most perfect conditions replicated. It is at one moment the light clouds are light and wispy around you and then you are under the blanket, again the hills on the horizon are natural and perfect. There has been a few notes that the early versions is that mist and low clouds don't fit in well around mountains or mostly in the valleys and the cloud shapes are hard and defined. It is a fair comment and notes of this is that it will be addressed and fixed soon. On the ground the sky looked realistic and natural, but once the daylight started to fade the sky became dramatic and the real "wow" factor crept in. The "wows" got bigger as the change from day to night happened in real time... ... open these images up to see the quality of the formations and the way the light reflects, note the excellent mist on the ground as well, it is just well... stunning. Flight Two Not one to miss an opportunity, I wanted to see those clouds airborne and I wasn't disappointed. I set up the B1900D and headed straight back to MAN. Climbing out of EGTE and the low mist showed the cold 2 degrees on the ground (this is December), up higher and the formations were amazing. Above the mist the twilight cloud formations were harder, fuller and you could see all the cloud detail and thickness. I have seen many amazing sunsets in X-Plane over the years, but that one is one of the best... There is nice light reflection off the clouds in the dark, sometimes milky with a full moon and sometimes darker, but it is very good as you skim along the clouds. Ground lighting (with mist) is great but we are pushing the limits here as there are light bands and sometimes even the cloud construction (2d objects) do show. Strobe in cloud is excellent, you lose that hard flash, and the soft strobes reflect well off the clouds around you (if you are in cloud) and it is very realistic. So how realistic is xEnviro? Well below is the default X-Plane weather (left) and then xEnviro switched on (right). X-Plane11 The heavier mist in X-Plane11 does have an impact, ground is softer, but the plugin takes away a lot of the worse mist effect as well and makes it (slightly) more visible. The conditions here are very hot 35º so you get more haze than you would normally get, but look at the cloud edge as the wind creates a boundary. This boundary effect is noticeable here as well (in X-Plane10) as you can see the sea air conditions are affecting the inland atmosphere. One area that X-Plane11 was better in was fog I turned up at MAN in the middle of a real early morning pea-souper... X-Plane11's extra mist boundary created a more fuller fill, and it looked simply amazing. You needed a white cane to find the runway, but it was as authentic as you can get. So straight to X-Plane10 for the same conditions and it is still good... But you notice that X-Plane10 is not as good in the visibility, there is a distinctive line were the fog hits the ground that is more blurred in XP11 creating that more enveloping feel. In leaving the ground the transition from murky fogginess through the translucent phase of a brightening view was simply perfect... How you push through cloud in a realistic way is one of the most important aspects of flight simulation. It is really impossible to imagine the complexity of mist and cloud enacting themselves around the aircraft, but this is the best I have seen yet. Laminar Research wanted their "little puffs" to create such a environment, it did work but clumsily. But here it works really well. There are a few flickers, and too many quick direction changes, but overall the effect is excellent in creating enveloping cloud around you, and after awhile you are just working on flying the aircraft in the environment more than being distracted by what is going on around you, in other words it is good as it feels real. There are other effects as well, like rain and snow... It is hard to simulate rain, because in reality it a reflective element in that you would only see it if you shone a light on it, like at night. Snow is easier as it has mass, and but both are simulated here, but the sounds are more realistic than the visual ideas. It works better of cause if the aircraft has that built in rain drop effect. Here you can choose between both 2d and 3d rain and snow, but the differences are in the environmental conditions around you... Lightning is also an effects feature that gives you lighting strikes around you and in the area on the ground. So how accurate is the downloaded data? You can of course check the current METAR data for your area, but that is only one part of the data dump. So the question is how real is the weather between the weather conditions now and the simulated xEnviro version. My reasoning was to just look out of my window! I was running xEnviro on the desktop and outside a storm had just come over and it started to dump rain, A check at Gold Coast Airport (Qld Australia) YBCG which is about 6km away from me and on X-Plane the scene was exactly the same with grey skies and buckets of rain... Storms blow over very quickly over here and within 30 minutes it was clearing, and soon my xEnviro changed to match the same conditions. The conditions continued to brighten and the changing data on xEnviro reflected the same changes and the wind direction and speed (24knts) was accurate. There is of course a delay between reality and events in the real world and a simulator, but it was a very good and reflected my changing current conditions very accurately. Chasing the storm was exciting and dangerous. Get close to those clouds and the turbulence that was created was very realistic, but I will note I do use the Headshake plugin by Simcoders, and that tends to shake you around more. But take a look at those towering thunderheads! Closer to Brisbane and the wind in your face at 22knts made a it a pretty hairy landing... Noted features coming soon to xEnviro are: Crepuscular rays, Variable volumetric clouds and haze, Visible precipitation volume, VATSIM & IVAO networked weather, Historical weather and MacOS compatiblity. A note in that as you can't set up specific conditions in xEnviro as I couldn't reproduce some of the aspects of this plugin, mainly electrical storms. But over the Christmas break if I encounter and the word here is "encounter!" such conditions then I will add them to this review, I also intend to do a few long flights to see the changing conditions over a period of time and I will report those encounters as well. Summary An Holy Grail in X-Plane has always been totally realistic weather, everyone has had a go in one for or another and your plugin folder is full of ideas and workarounds to try to make the dream a reality. Sundog's Sky-Maxx Pro was the first to really breakout of that ceiling (no pun intended) but this plugin from Commercial Simulation Systems has to be the next generation. But let us note the negatives at this point and I will stress they are all listed on the "to do" list on Commercial Simulation Systems website and updates are coming fast. My first quibble is the water reflections. They are the most visual aspects that don't work? You get pools of bright blue in any lake, stream, river or dam even with overcast conditions, and over a landscape they stick out like pools of bright blue. Cloud blend with terrain, horizon line went out on the update and the night environment needs a lot more work. The bright blue sky is an acquired taste, personally I got used to azure sky the more I used the plugin, but a few shades lower in the upper tint would be more realistic. Those non-transparent windows also show up in the wrong moments as well. Not being able to reproduce or save certain weather conditions, is idiosyncratic. You want the same conditions again or at least some control, but there is a strange fascination in the fact that like the real weather you are at it's control and conditions and not just adjusting them to your own needs, and replays are very interesting in a different time period and changed weather conditions... and you are faced with the point of doing it now or lose these conditions. A huge advantage is that the plugin is not intergrated or part of the root files of X-Plane. That gives it great framerate control and no pressure on the actual simulator's engine as it is quite separate. That also means the plugin is an easy switch on or off and that with any X-Plane upgrades is that you won't lose (overwrite) or have to reinstall any root files. I came to the table sceptical, totally unconvinced xEnviro would be the Holy Grail we are seeking, it is not perfect... yet. but it sure does deliver on what you really want and that is real world, perfect weather conditions. Has the plugin changed my view of X-Plane in a visual sense? The answer is yes, it is one of those tools that once it is now in there, there is no way (I would kick and scream) anyone will take it away from me, I just don't want to go back to plain old X-Plane, and I won't as it is that good. Timing here is a strange thing going on here. As with the release of X-Plane11 this environment engine has come along to shake up totally our X-Plane world, and like X-Plane11 it is in the same early stage of its development, but both new applications can and will have a significant impact on the way we use X-Plane. The xEnviro plugin is not cheap, but the point is how much will it deliver to your desktop in value and the significant value it brings to your flying, for me that answer is a lot as I was the ultimate sceptical... but now I am a true believer, ______________________________________________________________________ Yes! the xEnviro Environment Engine by Commercial Simulation Systems is Available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : xEnviro Price is US$69.90 Sorry this plugin is Windows only at this point, But Mac is coming! Features Load real-time meteorological data with download interval from 5 up to 60 minutes taking into account following factors: Wind direction and speed on ground and aloft, temperature, turbulence areas, icing areas and dangerous phenomena (thunderstorm& windshear) Simulate visual effects of different types of precipitations and phenomena: rain showers, snow, fog; Simulate visual raindrops effects on windshields both in 2D and 3D cockpits (if it’s loaded in aircraft model); Simulate in-cloud visual effects; Simulate visual effects of shades and aircraft lightning in clouds (Strobe lights, beacon lights, navigation lights, landing lights) Simulate landing lights “screen” effect during in-cloud and foggy flight; Volumetric lights effect; Simulate lightning on clouds surface from cities lights; High-detailed cloud shades; Custom cloud density and range; Simulate realistic breaking action effect; Display saturation, color gamma and cloud density, depending on weather conditions and time of day with real-time changing (automatically) or manually. ______________________________________________________________________ Installation : Download is via an installer provided and you deposit the plugin in your X-Plane "Resources/Plugins/" folder and the final install is 108MB. Full notes on how to use the installer were noted in the review. An uninstaller is also provided. Note: All other 3rd party (weather related) software (plugins/textures) must be removed to use this plugin Documents : Include: Ðóêîâîäñòâî ïîëüçîâàòåëÿ xEnviro User manual xEnviro And full license Agreements (EULA) Requirements : Minimum X-Plane 10.45+ or X-Plane 11 + Stable Internet Connection with data Speed no less than 512Kps Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 1Gb VRAM Recommended X-Plane 10.45+ or X-Plane 11 + Stable Internet Connection with data Speed no less than 51 Mbps Windows 7/Vista/ 8/8.1/ 10 - Not Mac compatible at this time 2Gb+ VRAM Current version: 1.04 (last updated Dec16, 2016) Software Compatibility with other plugins xEnviro” software is incompatible with 3rd party software which is used for weather loading, visual effects and other products which can modify environmental or graphical components. ______________________________________________________________________ Review by Stephen Dutton 19th December 2016 Copyright©2016: X-Plane Reviews Review System Specifications: Computer System: Windows - Intel Core i7 6700K CPU 4.00GHz / 64bit - 16 Gb single 1067 Mhz DDR4 2133 - GeForce GTX 980/SSE2 - Samsung Evo 512gb SSD Software: - Windows 10 - X-Plane 10 Global ver 10.45 / X-Plane11b2 Addons: Saitek x52 Pro system Joystick and Throttle : Sound - Bose Soundlink Mini : Headshake by SimCoders Scenery or Aircraft -Bombardier Dash 8 Q400 by FlyJSim (X-Plane.OrgStore) - US$30.00 -Beechcraft 1900D HD Series by Carenado (X-Plane.OrgStore) - US$34.95 - EGCC - Manchester Airport by Aerosoft (X-Plane.OrgStore ) - US$22.00 - EGTE - Exeter Airport by Wycliffe Barrett (X-Plane.Org) - Free
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